Tiger (6 page)

“Don't bother, girlfriend. The snapper will be fine.”

THEY RENTED A CAR IN BROOKLYN, USING A CREDIT card with Lewis's name on it that she was only supposed to use for Ursula Society business. Wally had no reason to think that Richard Townsend's security men had identified her yet, but they would eventually and she didn't want any transactions on her personal account that might help them find her—or Kyle.

As the two of them surveyed the menu of available cars, Wally noticed that one was a Lincoln Town Car—in white. It was a bittersweet reminder of Tevin, and how happy he had been when he had slid behind the wheel of an identical rented Town Car five months earlier. It had been a rare and exciting treat for him—a poor kid from Harlem—and his face beamed with pure happiness as he drove them out of the city and upstate, a route nearly identical to the one Wally and Kyle would be taking that afternoon.

The last trip Wally and Tevin had taken together in that car was to the Brooklyn Navy Yard, where everything went wrong. Tevin had died there, gunned down without mercy by Wally's own father, Alexei Klesko. It had been the worst moment of her life. . . .

Until Shelter Island.

“There's a chance the road will still be rough,” Kyle said, his voice snapping Wally out of her dark reverie. “Four-wheel drive might be a good idea.” They chose a Ford Explorer, in blue.

Wally was careful not to include the GPS option in the rental—it was possible for their movements to be traced that way—but once they were inside the SUV, Kyle used a screwdriver from the vehicle's tool kit to pry the LED panel out of the dashboard.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

“Saying you don't want GPS doesn't really do anything,” he said. “They keep it active for themselves so they can track their car.”

Once he had slid the panel out, Kyle immediately located a SIM card and pulled it out, holding it up for Wally to see.

“We're officially off the radar,” he said, tossing the SIM card into the glove compartment.

“Smart,” she said. “How do you know how to do that?”

“Half the guys at Sexton have helicopter parents who need to know every detail of their kids' lives, and that includes being able to trace them and their cars with GPS. Sometimes a guy needs to run silent.”

Wally took this as a good sign—Kyle apparently had some skills to contribute and was obviously thinking about their situation. Maybe he'd be more of a help on their fact-finding mission than she'd thought. She pulled out her own phone and shut off the GPS, just in case.

They made one quick stop at a convenience store, where they loaded up on a ridiculous amount of junk food and half a dozen cans of energy drinks—enough to keep them wired for the drive. Wally used the ATM in the store to withdraw a thousand dollars in cash. It was probably more than they would need, but she didn't want to make any Internet transactions once they were moving.

By the time they were officially on the road—Wally taking the first shift behind the wheel—it was early afternoon, with five or six hours of driving ahead. Wally plugged her phone into the stereo and streamed a playlist of Radiohead from Spotify. The music filled the Explorer with a trancelike soundtrack that fit well with the landscape rushing past them.

“It's all happening,” Kyle said, a hopeful look on his face.

“Yeah, it is,” Wally said.

It felt fun and exciting to break free of the city, but Wally reminded herself that she had gone way off the reservation. She was dealing with Kyle and his case in exactly the wrong way, and she had lied about it to Lewis, who trusted and cared for her. It wouldn't do any good to beat herself up about it—that would be a waste of time, now—but she vowed to be smarter and more conscientious as things moved forward.

A couple of hours into their drive, another thought came to Wally: their route to the Adirondacks would take them just fifty or sixty miles east of Neversink Farm, where Jake and Ella were now living. The thought of seeing them again was tempting, but it also made her anxious—they had loved Tevin as much as Wally had, and it had partly been her selfishness that had killed him. She wondered if they had forgiven her yet, or if they even thought of her.

“Would you be cool with a minor detour?” she asked Kyle.

“Sure. Where to?”

“My friends live on a farm north of Utica. If we just stay on the interstate it'll only add an hour or so.”

“Sounds good. I'll be glad if you get something from this trip too.”

Another hour of driving took them to the exit at a town called Mohawk, and from there they drove country roads north into a stretch of lush green pastureland. For miles, one farm flew by after another, with lakes and scattered woodland in between. A turn onto a long dirt road eventually led them to a two-story white farmhouse on top of a small hill, overlooking a lake. The sign at the open gate read
NEVERSINK FARM
.

They paused at the gate and looked the place over.

“Wow,” Kyle said. “This is the real deal, right? An actual farm.”

“I guess so,” Wally said. “I've never been here before.”

“Did your friends grow up here, or what?”

“No, it's a kind of residential thing for at-risk youths. Kids from the street and all that. They work the farm and go to school. A fresh start. Which is what my friends needed more than anything.”

“That actually sounds good. I wonder if they have room for me,” he joked.

They pulled into the dirt driveway and motored up to the farmhouse, where they parked and climbed out of the Explorer. Two other vehicles were parked there, both of them well-used and rusted old Ford pickup trucks. Several other buildings sprawled over the property, including a huge red barn—of course—and another building that looked like it might be a bunkhouse. The pasture held sheep and goats and about twenty head of cattle, as far as Wally could tell.

The setting was beautiful and calm—like a perfect landscape painting, Wally thought. She imagined Jake and Ella—two city kids—working this farm in overalls and flannel shirts. She couldn't help smiling at the idea. They were adaptable, for sure. They would thrive as long as they were together.

An unassuming man in his forties came out to meet them. He wore canvas work pants and a T-shirt. His clean-shaven face was weathered and creased, evidence of a life lived outdoors doing hard work. He shook their hands as he introduced himself.

“I'm Stan Hooks,” he said, squinting at them.

“Hi,” Wally said. “I'm Wally, and this is Kyle. Sorry to just barge in—I know you probably have set visiting times, but—”

“You're Wally Stoneman?” Stan wanted to know.

She was taken aback. “Yes.”

“Jake and Ella have told a few stories,” Stan explained. “You're something of a legend around here.”

Hearing this, Wally felt a huge rush of emotions: relief, happiness, regret. Jake and Ella still thought of her, and they still cared for her. How had she
not
known that would be true? Why had she kept herself at a distance from them for so long, when what she needed most in the world was friends she could trust?

“If it's all right, I'd like to see them.”

“I'm really sorry,” Stan said. “Most everyone is down in western Pennsylvania for a few days. It's a
4
H event—they're showing our hogs and taking some classes. Jake and Ella are going to be really disappointed they missed you.”

Wally's heart sank a little. She couldn't imagine anything better at that moment than to have her friends' arms around her. To come so close and miss them made her heart ache.

“Me too,” she said. “Let them know I stopped by?”

“I'll be sure to,” Stan said. “I know it'll make them happy that you tried.”

After leaving a short note for her friends, Wally and Kyle got back on the road. Wally felt a wave of sadness as they pulled away, Stan Hooks waving goodbye in the rearview mirror. Her disappointment was obvious enough for Kyle to see.

“You okay?”

She was on the verge of tears, actually, but she waited for the feeling to pass before answering.

“Yeah, just sad. The good thing is, I had some questions—some things that were weighing me down. I think I just got the answers.”

“Good answers?”

“Yeah, I think so.”

They made it back to the rural highway and stopped at a gas station to fill the thirsty Explorer and take bathroom breaks. From there, Kyle took the wheel. The highway led them north into the thick of the Adirondacks, a winding road through dense, green forest, broken up by occasional lakes and abundant streams that were flowing full from the runoff of winter snow.

After an hour or so—by then it was late afternoon—Kyle turned the Explorer off onto a two-lane dirt road, rutted and rough. They followed this track for five slow, bumpy miles until the road ended, becoming a private drive with
NO TRESPASSING
signs everywhere.

“Private road?” Wally asked. “Does that mean this is all yours from here?”

“All my father's, yeah. It's a lot of land. We have a local guy who comes in the spring to grade the road, but he obviously hasn't been through yet.”

The dirt was even rougher now, and several times they were forced to stop and clear fallen branches out of the way. When the private drive finally ended, the first thing Wally saw was the enormous lodge constructed of actual logs—like something out of a Ralph Lauren ad, she thought—two stories high, with a large main section and long wings stretching out at both sides. Just a hundred feet from the porch of the lodge was a big lake. It spanned at least a mile across and there were no other homes visible on the shore.

“Wow,” she said. “It's like some kind of mountain paradise.”

“I know.”

They climbed out of the car and stretched. The air was very quiet, but then a soft, mournful sound came to them from the water.

Wally looked across the water and could see a pair of birds floating a hundred yards out, their elegant necks silhouetted against the reflection of the deep-orange sun, hanging low in the sky. Wally followed Kyle past the house and toward the lake, where an old and weathered wooden dock reached fifty feet or so out onto the water. Crossing the gravelly shore, they reached the dock and began to walk out toward the end, the wood under their feet creaking loudly and echoing out over the water.

Wally could see that, for Kyle, returning to this place was a powerful experience. He seemed drawn to the lake by an invisible force, his eyes never leaving the water.

“How long since you've been back here?” she asked.

Kyle ignored the question, instead skipping a few yards ahead and peeling off his clothes. It all came off—boots, socks, sweatshirt, shirt, and cargo pants, until only his boxers were left. Then he sprinted as fast as he could and dove athletically off the edge of the dock, disappearing with hardly a splash under the surface of the lake.

Wally reached the end of the dock and scanned the surface of the water. The ripples from Kyle's dive radiated away, eventually quieting altogether, until everything was still and silent again. How much time had passed since he'd gone in? Fifteen seconds? Twenty? Wally started getting nervous—she stepped to the very edge of the dock and peered down into the water.

“Kyle?” Wally called out, a hint of panic in her voice.

No reply. Ten more seconds passed, but it felt more like ten minutes.

“Kyle!” Now she was genuinely scared for him. She kicked off her shoes—fully prepared to go in after him—but just then he burst to the surface in front of her, rising high out of the water and splashing back down again, hyperventilating from the cold of the water yet wearing a wide, happy smile on his face.

“Woo!” he hollered, elated and breathless. “It's so cold, but soooo awesome!”

“That was NOT funny,” Wally yelled back, but something about his goofy grin was contagious and she grinned back at him despite herself.

“What? You missed me?” he teased.

“Absolutely not,” she said, folding her arms squarely in front of her.

He responded by smacking the surface of the lake, splashing cold water on her.

“
Asshole
,” Wally objected as she jumped back, laughing with him.

He wiped the water from his eyes and spun slowly around, taking in the whole panorama of the lake and the lodge.

“It's weird,” he said. “I don't know if you have a place like this, but I can be away for a long time and forget the feeling it gives me—then as soon as I get back in this water it's like I never left.”

Wally sat down at the edge of the dock and rolled up her jeans, submerging her feet in the water until it lapped at her legs all the way up to her calf muscles.
Did
she have a place like that? The old apartment on the Upper West Side, maybe? She had some good memories from her life there, but not enough to make it a home, exactly—she had no desire to ever go back there. Wally wondered if there was a place from her earliest childhood in Russia that would make her feel that way, but if there was she had no recollection of it.